


On The Line

by BoStarsky



Series: Soft Bois [7]
Category: BlacKkKlansman (2018)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, the bois being sof as usual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-07 11:38:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17365235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BoStarsky/pseuds/BoStarsky
Summary: Mortality isn’t something Ron thinks about a whole lot, he can’t seeing as he’s a cop. If he were to go around thinking of death all day he wouldn’t be much use. Still, when your mother calls you to say your father has passed there’s little he can do not to think about it.





	On The Line

**Author's Note:**

> The Soft Bois return at long last with a slightly sad installment
> 
> Enjoy!

Not all phone calls are good and this is one of them. Mortality isn’t something Ron thinks about a whole lot, he can’t seeing as he’s a cop. If he were to go around thinking of death all day he wouldn’t be much use. Still, when your mother calls you to say your father has passed there’s little he can do not to think about it. 

You’re never quite prepared for your parents dying, it’s an inevitability he’s known about since he learned of death and the softer version of what it is. He’s even seen a few people die. It’s hard to process that his invincible, hard as steel, dad is laying in a morgue down in El Paso collecting frost with a tag on his toe because of something as simple as a stroke. That’s not somewhere he was ever supposed to be. This isn’t a phone call he was ever supposed to receive. 

Down on the ground Itsy is circling his feet, begging for food or attention. In the living room Flip is watching the game, his beer bottle beading with condensation on the coffee table. Outside the world goes on, cars passing bringing people places. In the kitchen Ron’s world has stopped and he’s unaware of all these things, even his mama crying on the other end of the line. There’s a buzz in his head, the gears turning. Progress is slow, but he’s getting there. 

Soon enough he takes what feels like his first breath, deep and shuddering, managing to pull himself together long enough to inquire about the funeral. 

It’s next week. 

He needs to get to Texas by next week and there’s no excuse, Sgt. Trapp will just have to give him a few days off for the funeral. 

Flip is a detective for a reason, he has a good eye for seeing things which is why he sits up straight when Ron slumps back onto the couch. There’s no point in being stoic about it so Ron lays it out how it is and Flip calls in a favour from Trapp to get him the time off. Ron’s caught himself a good man, he knew this already, but at times like these it really shines through. 

Stepping off the plane in El Paso he already misses Flip, wishes he could have brought him down to meet his mama. That’s not the case though, he couldn’t do that to his grieving mother who keeps asking for grandchildren. Bringing a man to his father’s funeral would only make a bad thing worse. There’s no need for that kind of rebellion here. 

Stranger still is setting foot in the house where his family finally settled down, it’s so different, yet the same. That old chair his father treasured is still there in its corner amidst his mama’s more modern touch. Pictures on the walls change too, newcomers mingling with the tried and true. It’s home, just a home that’s moved on without him, too empty now that it’s lost one of its inhabitants.

Mama’s a lot like the house, she’s still the voice he hears over the phone every week, but he hasn’t seen her in a few years and time catches up quickly when you get to a certain age. Steely grey has started taking over her hair and there are new lines in her face. Her hugs have stayed the same. 

The first night back in his old bed he can’t sleep so he slips out into the kitchen to call Flip back in Colorado. 

“Ya,” he picks up just like he always does, never answering the phone properly. It’s one of those little things that makes Flip special in his eyes. 

“Hey, baby,”

They talk for over an hour, the comforting timber across the line distracting him away from why he’s sitting in his mother’s kitchen at one am. Flip should be here. That’s what you do at funerals, your mourn together with those closest to you. Flip had wanted to come, but there’s any number of reasons why that couldn’t happen. 

Ron spends four nights in his mother’s kitchen talking to a man he’s not supposed to love, that he loves more dearly than anything. When his mama asks about it he tells her the same thing he always does, that his girl says hi, and hates doing it because it makes him feel like a coward and a liar. 

But just the same with everything else in his life his mama has him beat when the dirt has settled over the coffin and all the paperwork is done. She blindsides him at breakfast when his bag is packed and waiting in the hall, “Next time bring your man with you,” for a second the world stops and he’s scared this’ll impact both him and Flip, their life back in Colorado. “Don’t look so scared, I’m too old to give a damn,” she grouses and life hits the play button once more. 

His mama isn’t happy about it by any stretch, disappointed in him for not settling down and having children, aiming for the white picket fence. Despite that Maybel Stallworth always has been reasonable enough to know you can’t decide who you’re going to love in the end. He just so happened to fall in love with a 34 year old, white, Jewish boy. Not exactly his mama’s ideal, but he’ll have to do. 

Flip meets him at the airport in Denver and Ron didn’t think that the sight of plaid and cowboy boots could ever make him so happy. Still, the facts are right there and it would be stupid to deny them. Like his Mama said, you can’t choose who you love, but you should embrace them all the same. 

A hug is about as much as they can get away with someplace crowded like this, they get away with a little more in Flip’s truck. A soft kiss and a hand to hold is just what he needs after four days in what felt like a funeral parlour dealing with death and everything related. It’s good to taste the cigarettes and coffee on Flip’s breath again, smell the Old Spice aftershave, and feel the calluses on his hands. All the little things that add up to a whole, what made him fall in love in the first place. Today he feels it deeper than ever with the reminder that life is fragile still hanging over his head. 

From now on he’ll have no regrets in this thing of theirs, a little embarrassment or anger isn’t worth a lifetime of guilt should the worst possible thing happen to either of them. 

“You know I love you, right?” Since the time he first said it Ron has been pretty liberal with those three words needing Flip to hear it as often as needed for him to keep believing in it. This time feels a little different, heavier. 

“I love you too,” Flip says for the first time and this moment becomes a sort of echo of the time Ron confessed his own love for the first time. 

It floods him with such affection that he pulls Flip into another kiss with no intention of letting go anytime soon. Right now he couldn’t care less that they’re sitting in the dark in Stapleton airport’s parking garage where anyone could see them. The moment is too important to care about such things right now. 

Man, it’s good to be home.


End file.
